Glazed Cinnamon-Cardamom Buns

After seeing the cinnamon roll from Paris's Circus Bakery pop up everywhere on Instagram, we developed this recipe as an homage. (Hey, it was cheaper than a plane ticket.) Circus Bakery's roll is made with sourdough, but our cardamom-scented version is more briochelike; of course, they're both streaked with a sweet, buttery cinnamon filling. It takes some practice to master the distinctive twisted shape—try it out a few times with a twisted-up towel or piece of parchment paper to get a feel for it. And if your knot isn't perfect, don’t worry! The buns will be delicious no matter what.

Preparation

For the Dough:

Heat milk in a small saucepan over low until just warm; an instant-read thermometer should register 105°F–115°F. Pour into the large bowl of a stand mixer. Whisk in yeast and let sit until foamy, 10–15 minutes. You should see a layer of foam on the surface; this means that the yeast is active.

Add egg, egg yolk, flour, granulated sugar, cardamom, and salt to yeast mixture and mix with dough hook on low speed until well combined. Increase speed to medium and continue to mix until dough is smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. Gradually add butter 1 Tbsp. at a time, mixing to incorporate slightly before adding more. When 6 Tbsp. butter are incorporated, mix until dough is smooth, supple, and shiny, 10–15 minutes longer (you need to mix this long to develop the gluten).

Transfer dough to a large buttered bowl, cover with plastic wrap and a kitchen towel, and let sit at room temperature until doubled in size, 1–1 1/2 hours. Punch dough down, cover bowl tightly in plastic wrap, and chill overnight (the slow proof creates more flavor because it gives the yeast more time to process the sugar).

Have your tools and filling nearby; you want to work quickly and keep dough as chilled as possible to make rolling more manageable. Turn out dough onto a lightly floured piece of parchment paper and roll to a 1/4"-thick rectangle, about 16"x12". Cover with plastic and chill until dough is firm, 30–60 minutes.

Spread butter mixture over two-thirds of dough. Fold plain side over the middle, then fold opposite third over (like folding an envelope). Roll to a 12"x8" rectangle about 1/2" thick. Slice lengthwise into eight 1"-thick strips.

Working one at a time, lay strip on clean work surface with long side facing you. Using your palms, gently twist each end in opposite directions until entire strip is spiraled. Hold one end of strip between a thumb and index finger. Working away from you, tightly wrap strip around 3 fingers. Wrap around fingers again, placing second loop closer to the palm of your hand. As you bring strip across the back of your hand, cross over first loop, angling toward the end of your index finger. Cross dough over front of your hand and tuck the end into the center while removing your fingers and pushing through to the other side to create a knot. Check out step-by-step photos here. You want to twist these tightly so that they rise while baking. If you’re having trouble, twist them into any kind of knot that you can—just make sure it's wrapped tightly.

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Reviews

Americans: "Here's a perfect recreation of a Paris bakery's cinnamon buns"
Also americans: 3 tbsp, 2 cups, 16 1/2 times the weight of a bald eagle
Seriously guys, please give measures in grams/ml for all ingredients, or anything that can be mathematically translated to them. Doughs are delicate and the only thing that happens is that people end up complaining that theirs is not as good as the original's supposed to be.

Award winning recipe! I made and entered them in the OC Fair, and they won 1st place. They are so delicious and beautiful. I've made them about 10 times now, and every time the lucky recipients rave about them. They have more surface area than a traditional cinnamon roll, so they don't have that super soft inside texture. If you really like that, then you will be somewhat disappointed in these. They are not quick or easy. They take about 2 hours day 1, with about an hour of active time. I have to let my mixer rest for 15 minutes in between the two beating sessions. I put the mixer on a placemat that has a rubbery underside to keep the mixer from moving around the counter too much. Total time on day 2 is about 3 hours, of which about an hour is active. I've found them easier to work with when I refrigerated the rolled out dough for the full 60 minutes. After I form the buns, I let them rise for 1 hour. They never did double, but 1 hour in a house that's 75° works well.

These were delicious! Although time consuming with regards to rise times, they were not difficult to make at all and the fridge time actually worked out better for me to have them ready for breakfast the next day. I added a bit of sourdough starter but not sure it made a difference in taste. (May play with this more next time.) At any rate, they were soft and flavorful without being too sweet. Will absolutely make them again.

I just finished making these buns and I am very disappointed. For all the time I put into making them, it was not worth it. They came out looking exactly like the picture. I find them rather tasteless. I made them to sell at my Farmers Market. Based on the reviews, I made them, expecting Nirvana. The sticky buns I made a few weeks ago from Cooks Illustrated has a fabulous dough. When making this dough, it looked very strange. And beating it with my dough hook, was rocking my kitchen aid mixer. And I hv a 6 quart one and it’s an old one. They don’t make them as good any more. And the instructions I felt were not great. I took my hand mixer to mix the filling , so I could spread it better. I won’t make it again. Sorry.

Ok ladies and maybe Gentlemen. Don’t want to be offensive here. I am just starting to make. I went to culinary school for pastry. This is not to brag. Just that I know a little something about baking and working with yeast. I know sugar feeds yeast and salt kills it. I usually use Rapid Rise. Or Instant. But I keep Active also. I keep in my refrigerator. AND, I look at the expiration date. So here I look at the instructions on how to do the yeast and just says milk and yeast. Hmmm. 105-115. Hmm. I usually hv done 100- 110. Or 105-110. I tried twice with nothing! Like what? Then I look at the back of my Fleischmann’s packet and sure enough they say to add a tsp. of sugar to activate the yeast. So on my third try it worked of course. Should hv gone with my gut. To be continued. I’ll write a review on how it comes out.

they were ok. The twist is a nice look but it created too much surface are, and in my opinion the best part of a cinnamon bun is the middle or bottom, where the soft brioche dough comes apart. These buns were just too tough, with too much crust. Next time I might try letting the buns proof together in a pan so the edges meet. I did love the cardamom flavour.

SO GOOD! This was one of the first things I've ever baked and it turned out ah-mazing. Coworkers and friends were so impressed.
I don't have a stand mixer, so I had to mix / knead the dough by hand and they still turned out delicious and fluffy. I added some crushed walnuts for some crunch and would love continue experimenting with the filling - but the cardamom + cinnamon are delicious together. Will definitely make these again!

The first time I made these I didn't divide the brown sugar and the filling oozed out a bit. They were still delicious. I'm making them again. This time I feel that I mastered the knot and they look really good. I divided the brown sugar this time and I know they are going to be awesome

The texture of these is perfect. I didn't bother with the fussy shaping, and I prefer confectioners' sugar icing. I had guests and we all enjoyed them. I like the cool rise aspect to this recipe because you don't have to get up at the crack of dawn to make them.

To Rosrosa from Ithaca, some of my topping seeped out also, I think that's unavoidable given the twist. If you are worried about burn on the pan, cook on parchment.
RE: not waiting overnight, the overnight slow proof is a technique I've used before for bread. The recipe should work fine without that step, the dough just won't have as yeasty of a flavor. You could start the dough in the morning and leave in the refrigerator for 6 hours, prepping and cooking for dinner. That should work just fine. I suspect that the sourdough based recipe used in the Circus Bakery doesn't have an overnight proof at all, since you'll get the tang from the sourdough starter.

Great recipe and will definitely make again. A few notes.
First, don't worry if the dough doesn't seem to rise the evening before (mine didn't). I didn't punch it down at all, just let it rise (sit) for 90 minutes, into the fridge, proceeded the next day.
Second, perhaps because my first rising wash't as active, rolling it out it was thinner than 1/2 inch. Doesn't matter, just get it to the 16" x 12" size.
Third, the shaping is super easy, the instagram videos are just fine, it works very well.
OK some modifications.
#1 The author doesn't specify which 2/3 you are supposed to spread the filling. If you think for a second, spread / fold on the longer (16") direction.
#2 I will roll to 16" x 10" next time. Why? Well, you need to roll the folded pieces back out to 12" x 8", and if you fold a 16" x 12" rectangle, you end up with a 5.3" x 12" rectangle. It's hard to roll that 5.3" dimension to 8" without extending the 12" dimension at least a bit. It' would be much easier starting with a 5.3 x 10" that you are rolling to 8" x 12".
#3 WAY too much glaze at the end. Reduce to 1/2 cup of brown sugar in 1/4 cup of water unless you want to have a 1/2 cup of glaze to discard (I glazed twice, there is no way to use a cup of glaze on 8 buns).
BUT a fantastic recipe, this is definitely going into the rotation.
Interested if anyone develops a version that uses sourdough as a starter, or develops a savory version with ham, chopped onion, perhaps cheese?, as filling. Maybe I'll try and post here!

These were absolutely delicious and not over the top sweet. I much prefer the simple syrup topping to an icing. The whole process was quite simple and the twisting technique was a success. Watching the video on IG from Circus Bakery certainly made the twist/assembling make perfect sense. I made these by hand as I don't have a dough hook. A little elbow grease and they still worked out brilliantly.

This is a straightforward recipe and pretty easy to follow. They taste divine. I made mine with a filling of half cardamom half cinnamon. Next time I may use cardamom seeds and crush myself. This shaping technique didn’t work for me and my big hands so I twisted and then shaped in a snail. They looked great. My only issue was that I cooked with a timer and the buns looked perfect everywhere except when I lifted them they were slightly burnt in the bottom, but I could see the filling seeping out while I cooked them and so wonder if this is normal. I have seen several videos and many people seem also to have this issue. Any advice on how to solve this? I did bake for the full 30 min. And perhaps that was slightly too long. Im also not into having to wait overnight for the dough and I may not be able to do that next time. Any advice for making them the same day? Thanks! Great recipe!

I made these this morning and they are great - the twist is not difficult and the favour was great - I love lots of cinnamon so this recipe fulfilled that aspect. I shared them with my sister, son, daughter in law and grandson and all thought the recipe was a keeper

I have a suggestion for Epicurious to assist me and other members of the audience that are spacially impaired. Since there are videos dispersed throughout the recipe, why not show videos on how to execute the twisting and assembly of the roll rather than one showing how to make gravy and stuffing for Thanksgiving?
I know it would help me see how to do this before I try doing it and ending up with a loosely rolled hunk of dough. As always, thanks for your delicious recipes. I gave this one four forks because it sounds delicious and looks impressive!